Terry Collins acknowledged being embarrassed by tonight’s loss and said, if you want to know if this team has quit, ‘You’ve got to ask them. I have my own opinion, but I’m not going to express it publicly. … I’m not inside their heads.”

Collins said he saw things tonight from his team that were ‘unacceptable,’ though he wouldn’t say specifically what he was referring to.

To read Matthew Cerrone's thoughts Terry's answer, click here.

Matthew Cerrone, Lead Writer

Interesting tactic, in that – instead of calling people out by name in public, Bill Parcells style – he’s forcing his players to speak for themselves. I like this. You know what, this isn’t Terry’s fault. The blame for having one of the worst second-half records of all time falls on Sandy Alderson (who put the roster together) and it falls on the actual roster, who, at some point, has to execute. Is it more Sandy, less the players? Less Sandy, more the players? I don’t know, but why (after 149 games and nearly 400 conversations with these reporters) should Terry have to explain why these men couldn’t even live up to their limited potential? And, why should he have to defend Sandy’s decisions? I don’t blame him for stepping aside at this point. He’s right to pass the mic so he and everyone else can see who the real leaders are on this team and who isn’t, all of which will be useful information when deciding who comes back next year and who doesn’t…

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Sept. 20, 11:07 pm: Here are player responses to questions about if the team has quit and if they’re embarrassed (not only by tonight, but the entire second half):

David Wright:“The record speaks for itself. … Of course it’s frustrating. We take a lot of pride in what we do. You go up there and try to compete and we’re going through a stretch now where we’re just not executing and getting the job done. … We’re in this thing together. Obviously, Terry is a part of this and everybody in here is accountable. Terry’s upset, we’re obviously upset and rightfully so. We’ve been awful and when you’ve played as poorly as we have there’s going to be a lot of people upset. … I don’t believe anyone in here has quit. We’re going through a rough time right now and we have to find a way to finish strong. There’s a number of different reasons why individually guys are going out there trying to get the job done and playing hard. No, I don’t feel like we’ve quit. I just feel we’re playing poorly and the record indicates that. … All I can answer is for the guys in here and I see the preparation and the work their putting in and it’s not showing on the field. It’s discouraging from the fan’s perspective I’m sure, but if you multiply that 100 times that’s how discouraging it is in here, because this is guy’s livelihoods. We take a lot of pride in this. It’s just, for whatever reason, we’re not getting the job done. … I think everyone in here is embarrassed. … We should be, because we’ve been very, very bad in the second half.”

Ike Davis:“No, we haven’t quit. … This is our job, this is how we make money, this is how guys feed their families, is to go out and perform and no on wants to not do good. So, I mean, no, no one’s quit. … Any time you get beat like this (tonight) it’s embarrassing, but no one quit.”

Neither Davis nor Wright would elaborate on what Collins said to his players in private after the game, but the general gist, as Davis put it, was, ‘He was not pleased.’